Montana Homecoming

by Jeannie Watt

“I never got the story as to why the two of you ended up being the barn cleaners.” Nick said.

  “Well, Travis needed help and I owed him for that elbow in the eye,” Cassie replied with a half smile.

  “Not going to give me a straight answer, eh?”

  “Truthfully, Will caught us in the middle of a huge argument the day after the black-eye incident and shamed us into working together.”

  Nick made a silent O with his mouth. “That explains a lot.”

  “I didn’t tell Katie about the argument because she’s been going all mother hen on me.”

  “She’s worried about you.”

  Cassie leaned forward. “Do you know how stressful that is?”

  “I know what it’s like to have people worried about you.”

  “Touché.” Cassie leaned back again. After his wife died, they’d all worried about him and the girls, had tried to do what they could, which wasn’t much other than to be there if he needed support. “Are you worried about me, too?”

  Nick focused somewhere on his cup as he considered the question. “I’m not worried.” He brought his gaze back to hers. “I think you’re making some mistakes, though.”

  Cassie’s jaw tightened, but she was ready to hear his take on matters. She had asked, so she wasn’t going to blow him off. “I’m listening.”

  “I understand why you’ve had to sacrifice holiday visits and such, but I think your original—and valid,” he added quickly, “excuse is gone. Now it’s becoming a habit.”

  She opened her mouth, then closed it again. “I like my job. I want to do it well.”

  “I know.”

  When he didn’t argue with her, or tell her that she was sacrificing her life for her job, she felt emboldened to admit, “I have approached work with a sort of tunnel vision.”

  “Goal-oriented people do that.”

  She gave a nod.

  “Are you going to keep doing it?” he asked gently.

  “I’m going to try not to, but...” She pushed her coffee cup aside and leaned her forearms on the table. “The problem is that I conditioned the school board to expect that from me. If I slow down to a normal workload, I’ll look like I’m slacking.” She let out a breath that lowered her shoulders. “And I got a call yesterday. Something may or may not be brewing at work.”

  Nick raised his eyebrows, so she explained, laying out what her associate had told her, finishing with, “Of course, Anna Lee may have misinterpreted.”

  “But you prefer to fear the worst.”

  “Yep.” One corner of her mouth tightened.

  “Not much you can do about it either way.”

  She patted the table with the palm of her hand. “That’s what’s driving me nuts. I’m not on the school district payroll. It’s as if I don’t exist until next July. I have no say. No clout.” She collapsed back into her chair. “Travis essentially told me not to die the thousand deaths, but it’s kind of hard not to.”

  “I understand. And I also agree with Travis.”

  Travis, who appeared to be speaking with the voice of experience.

  Cassie pulled her cup back toward her, more to have something to do with her hands than because she was interested in finishing the coffee it held. She raised her eyes to meet her brother’s gaze. “Does Travis have some secret thing in his life I don’t know about?”

  “Probably quite a few,” Nick said dryly.

  Cassie scowled down at her cup. “The only reason I ask is because he seemed to understand what I was going through today.”

  “He knows about the job situation?”

  “I told him.”

  Nick seemed mildly surprised. “You guys are moving forward.”

  “Not everything is a competition,” Cassie quoted. “Anyway, when we talked, I just had this feeling that something was up. Something he wasn’t going to talk about.”

  “It might concern his dad. I’m sure Dan’s condition is difficult for those who love him.”

  “Yes.”

  “You know, Travis only came back to the ranch because no one else could work with Will after his dad’s RA took a turn for the worse. I think Will was stressed-out and taking it out on the guys he hired.”

  Cassie frowned at him. How could she have not known this?

  “You weren’t here,” Nick said, reading her thoughts. “They hired and fired three or four guys when Dan was getting ready to move to Arizona. Travis came back to fill in and never left.”

  Cassie narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re saying that he’s there out of duty?”

  “I’m saying that we all make choices and he made his.”

  “Huh.”

  Nick put his hands on the table and pushed his chair back. “And on that note, I’m going to take a shower.”

  Cassie nodded at the table as she digested this new information. “Don’t clog the drain with sawdust,” she called absently.

  “Yeah. I’ll try not to.”

  After he’d headed down the hall to his bedroom, Cassie got to her feet and paced over to the dining room window, which faced the direction of the McGuire ranch. She’d always assumed Travis was right where he’d intended to be all along. He’d studied agriculture. The family owned a ranch. It made sense.

  Or maybe it had just seemed to make sense.

  Cassie knew of only one way to find out.

  * * *

  CASSIE ARRIVED EARLY on their last day of junk hauling and, after parking her brother’s truck, went straight to the small corral where her mare happily munched grassy alfalfa.

  “How’d she do?” she asked after Travis tossed hay to a heifer he’d brought in yesterday due to a limp.

  He wondered if he should soften the blow or just state facts. He went with facts.

  “She needs miles put on her, Cassie. A lot of miles. You’re not going to plunk along a trail and enjoy yourself. She’s really skittish.”

  “Ever?”

  “I don’t know.” The mare had shied several times and twice she’d attempted to spin and head back to the ranch. She was testing him, seeing what she could get away with, and she needed to learn that she wasn’t going to get away with anything. He had no doubt that Cassie could ride the mare, but she was looking for a pleasure mount to relax with.

  Cassie looked past him to the field where his McHenry mares were grazing, foals by their sides. The wind ruffled her hair and she smoothed it without breaking her gaze. “You’re saying she might be out there next year, making babies.”

  “I can’t afford to pay what you paid for her.”

  She shifted her gaze his way. “You almost paid that price.”

  “I was very afraid I was going to have to. When you made that last bid, I could have kissed you.”

  She took a long look at his mouth, stirring up memories of when they had kissed; memories that were pretty close to the surface, because every now and again he revisited them.

  “And you did,” she said as she lifted her gaze.

  “Well,” he said with a half shrug, “I owed you.”

  “Actually—” she shifted her weight as she considered the matter “—I kissed you.”

  He smiled a little. “If I still owe you, we could fix things.”

  “Uh—” she shook her head “—I don’t think so.” She didn’t step back, but she turned her body so that she wasn’t fully facing him as she once again studied the mare.

  They’d come a ways, he and Cassie. She trusted him to a point. He wished she trusted him more. He wished she saw him differently—not as someone she shouldn’t kiss, but maybe someone she should.

  “Last day before the big pressure wash,” she said conversationally. Talk of kissing was now officially off the table. He couldn’t help but think that he might find an opportunity to bring it up again.

  “It is,” he s
aid as he started walking slowly in the direction of the barn. Cassie fell into step and the vibe between them was remarkably relaxed, despite kissing talk. “Feeling better about the stuff that was eating you yesterday?”

  She gave a soft snort. “I was until you brought it up.”

  He played along and rolled his eyes, even though he could see that she was more herself today. “Sorry.”

  “Tell me about staying on the ranch.”

  He glanced down at her, but she didn’t meet his eyes. “Staying on the ranch?”

  “Did you always plan to run the ranch?”

  “Who have you been talking to?” When she shrugged, he narrowed his gaze and said, “Nick?”

  “I’m not naming sources.”

  “But you’ve been talking about me.”

  Her cheeks flushed a delicate rose. “I was trying not to think about my job.”

  “And I was the next thing on your mind?”

  “Don’t get a swelled head,” she muttered. “Did you want to do something else?”

  “I had a job,” he said as they came to a stop at the open bay door. Inside, the last of the equipment waited. They didn’t have a full day’s work, but he had some other chores before they geared up for pressure washing.

  “Did you?”

  “I did. But my dad’s condition was going south fast and I decided to come home.”

  “Any regrets?”

  “Who doesn’t have regrets? I would have liked to have worked for a while, experienced something new.” Reynaldo kept calling him and asking him to do just that. “But I like my life just fine.”

  “I never guessed that you wanted anything but to be on the ranch.”

  Neither had his grandfather, and Travis wasn’t about to clue the old guy in.

  “I don’t talk about it, because of Grandpa.”

  He could see from the look she sent him that he didn’t need to worry about her discussing the matter. “Gotcha.”

  She shifted her attention to the interior of the barn, giving him her profile. Her jaw muscles were relaxed, softening the line of her chin, making him believe that she had gotten a handle on the job problem.

  She turned her head suddenly, and caught him staring. “That’s not a look of concern, is it?”

  He shook his head. “Today you can worry about me.”

  Her mouth curved into a gentle smile and he was smacked with an almost overwhelming urge to kiss those beautiful lips.

  “Naw. I have faith in your abilities.”

  “Thanks.” He gestured toward the barn. “Shall we?”

  Cassie sucked in a breath, then buttoned the top button of her shirt. “Yes. We shall.”

  * * *

  WILL SHOWED UP about an hour after Cassie had left for the day. Travis straightened from where he was sorting through random garden equipment.

  “What are you doing here?” Last he’d heard the plumbers were coming that afternoon.

  “Jake, the plumber, had an emergency. He won’t be able to come until tomorrow.” Will propped his hands on his hips. “Amazing how much space there is in an empty barn.”

  “And how little space there is in the driveway.” Travis gestured at the piles that surrounded them.

  Will gave a grunt of agreement. “Rosalie wants to see the space. We’re coming out tomorrow evening.”

  “The interior should be drying by that time.”

  “Good.” Will studied the dusty interior for another couple seconds, then said, “Going to be one heck of a mess behind the barn with all the runoff.”

  “We’ll make sure the wedding guests don’t venture back there.”

  “Most of our guests have seen worse,” Will said. He jerked his head toward the house. “I need to pack up some more clothes.”

  “Or buy a washer for your town house.”

  “Oh, that’s coming. The plumbers are going to put in a more modern drain system tomorrow after fixing the other problems.”

  “I bet Rosalie will enjoy being able to wash her clothes.”

  “So will I.” Will grinned. “I kind of like doing laundry.”

  “I have a pile—”

  “No.”

  When they got to the kitchen, Will automatically pulled two beers out of the fridge, holding them up as if he’d never seen beer before. “Ultra hops?” He made a face and looked back into the fridge. “Where’s my beer?”

  “Gone. Be open-minded,” Travis said.

  “So Rosalie keeps reminding me.”

  Travis had a feeling his grandfather loved being managed, and it definitely took a special person to do that.

  They settled on the porch and Travis watched as Will took his first sip. He lowered the bottle and scowled at it, then drank again.

  “Different.”

  “In a bad way?”

  Will shook his head. “I could get used to it.”

  “Once you have a decent IPA, you never go back.”

  “Oh, I’ll go back,” Will assured him before tipping up his bottle. He wiped his lips with the back of his hand, then said, “How are you and Cassie doing?”

  Travis gestured at the barn in front of him with his bottle. “You saw the inside of the barn. Not a single drop of blood on the walls.”

  “Walls can be washed.”

  “Exactly what Cassie said.”

  “Did you have to?”

  Travis frowned at his grandfather.

  “Wash the walls,” he said impatiently.

  “Did we fight? Oh, yeah.” Travis smiled at the memory. He sensed his grandfather studying him a little too intently and turned his head in time to catch Will midstare. “Nothing that would upset Rosalie. We’ve learned to—” he tilted his chin as he considered the words most likely to end this conversation “—work together without sniping.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Is that all? No sniping?”

  Travis gave his grandfather a full-on frown. “What are you getting at?” And why aren’t you letting this go?

  Will cleared his throat. “I don’t want you guys to light into each other at the wedding. That’s all.”

  Travis didn’t believe for one minute that was all. Not when Will was acting so darned weird.

  But hey, maybe it was just a case of prewedding jitters.

  “We won’t light into one another. You have my word.”

  “All right, then.” Will took a very long drink.

  Travis raised his own bottle. “Okay.”

  Yeah. His grandfather was definitely being weird.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  “YOU UNDERSTAND THAT there will be no water fights,” Travis said as he plugged the pressure washer into a heavy-duty extension cord and then took hold of the wand. After dressing in rubber overalls and coats with hoods, they’d made a loose plan of action. Cassie would spray down the upper walls, the underside of the loft and the columns with the garden hose, getting rid of not only dust but half a century of dirty cobwebs. He would use the pressure washer to get the serious grime off the wooden planks of the barn floor and the lower walls. They’d spray as much debris as possible out the back door where no one would see it once the doors were closed. And if someone did venture back there during the wedding celebration, then they did so at their own risk.

  Cassie gave him a bland look, then pulled the trigger on the nozzle of the garden hose she held, squirting his rubber boots.

  “Really?” he asked as Will’s old dogs, who’d been sleeping in the sun near the bay door, seemed to sense danger. They got to their feet and ambled a good distance out into the driveway, where they settled in the warm gravel.

  When Travis glanced back at Cassie, she gave him an unrepentant shrug, looking very much like the girl he’d never have dreamed he’d fall for. But he had an
d every day they spent together hammered that home. “You do realize you’re outgunned...although, come to think of it, you never realized that before.”

  She mock sneered at him, a mere shadow of the sneers she used to send his way while they’d trash-talked.

  “I’ll pressure wash you right out of the barn,” he warned. “In your dreams.” Cassie squirted his feet again and he gave her a sharp look before turning on the machine. She held up a hand in surrender as it rumbled to life, and he grinned at her as it continued its threatening chugs. It didn’t seem like a good time to tell her he’d never seen her surrender before. She was relaxed, but not that relaxed.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  “As always.”

  They started working on opposite sides of the barn, and soon droplets of water filled the air, dampening their skin and hair. Despite the rubber clothing, there was no way to stay dry with a task of this magnitude. But there was also no other way to remove years of grain dust, silt and other broken-down organic materials than to wash them away. Despite wearing a hood tied under her chin, tendrils of damp hair were already sticking to Cassie’s cheeks.

  Focus on the job.

  He blasted the dirt in front of him, turning it to a muddy stream that he directed toward the door. The noise of the motor muffled the other sounds in the barn, so he barely heard the sharp cry that came just before a stream of water shot over his face, sending rivulets of cold water down his neck.

  He turned to Cassie to have a word, but she wasn’t looking at him. Instead she was practically dancing in place, staring at the floorboards in front of her, wearing a horrified expression.

  “What?” he demanded, wiping a hand over his face.

  “Snake.” She kept her gaze on the floor, as if expecting the animal to materialize out of nowhere.

  “I don’t see a snake.” He’d seen a couple of kittens peeking in through the rear door that day, but not one single snake. “Are you sure it wasn’t a kitten?” There were kittens in the vicinity. They saw the black-and-white mama, who was obviously nursing, on a daily basis.

  “I know the difference between a snake and a kitten,” Cassie said in a deadly voice before pointing to the planks a yard or so away from her boots. “He went through that big knothole in the floor. I almost stepped on him.”